How to remove gnome 3 and all its dependencies from a debian wheezy netinst
 

I downloaded a Debian wheezy netinstall iso file, and just made a very minimal installation with no Display manager or desktop environment.

I was using the terminal for testing purpose. I later installed cinnamon from Linux Mint backport repos. It worked fine.

Then, to have a display manager, I choose to install lightdm. I used the command

sudo apt-get install lightdm

The installation was successful, but when I restarted, Gnome 3 was also installed. How do I remove gnome3 and all its dependencies without affecting the system ?

as long as you unselect DE it shouldn''t install. you have to use the space bar to deselect it.

If you want linux mint, then just install linux mint... Do not mix 'buntu/mint with Debian.

cinnamon will install a lot of gnome3 dependencies as it's a fork of gnome-shell.